DOT: Disclose oil trains' risk

Companies shipping Bakken crude oil by train must provide communities along their routes with more information about the dangers of spills and explosions, DOT said in an emergency order Wednesday.

Transportation Secretary Anthony Foxx also issued a “safety advisory” asking — but not requiring — shippers of Bakken crude to discontinue using the older models of railroad tank cars commonly used for transporting the fuel. Instead, the department is asking them to use cars built with enhanced safety features.

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The actions came a week after a derailment and explosion in Lynchburg, Virginia, that sent flames and smoke towering into the sky and leaked oil into the James River. That was the latest in a series of oil train accidents that have inspired alarm in the U.S. and Canada in the past year, including a deadly blast that killed 47 people last summer in Lac-Mégantic, Quebec.

Lawmakers called Wednesday’s actions a good first step — but not a final answer. Canadian regulators announced two weeks ago that they were setting a mandatory three-year deadline for the older-model tank cars to be either retrofitted or retired.

“If we know that we want to get rid of these [cars] that we don’t think are a safe transport vehicle, we should come up with a date certain,” Senate Commerce Committee member Maria Cantwell (D-Wash.) said. “Making it voluntary isn’t enough.”

Cantwell said the issue is particularly worrisome because the one tank car that caught fire in Lynchburg may not have been one of the older-model cars, which are known by the designation DOT-111. That may “pose a question to us, is even the newest car going to be safe enough?” she asked.

Subsequently, Foxx told committee members Wednesday afternoon that to his knowledge the burned rail car was from a model called CPC-1232, which is built to a tougher standard than the DOT-111.

The Association of American Railroads issued a terse response to the emergency order on notification, saying railroads will “do all they can” to comply.

AAR said freight railroads have “for years worked with emergency responders and personnel to educate and inform them about the hazardous materials moving through their communities,” and that these “open and transparent communications” will continue.

Wednesday’s emergency order will apply to railroads running trains with more than 1 million gallons of Bakken crude — approximately 35 tank cars, according to DOT. The information shared must include estimated volumes of Bakken crude, the frequencies of the train traffic and the route the train will travel. Railroads will also be required to provide contact information for at least one responsible party.

Until now, companies shipping oil by rail have not had to notify communities about what hazardous cargoes were riding the rails through their streets at any given moment.

Foxx said the voluntary measures taken so far, including the request not to use DOT-111 cars, are intended to be an interim step until DOT’s Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration can finish a rule on tank car safety. He said it is his “intention that it will” be done by the end of the year, and that “I hope to have it done sooner than that if we can.”

The department has submitted a rule to the White House Office of Management and Budget for review but has not disclosed the contents.

Sen. Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.), a critic of oil trains’ safety record, praised Foxx ‘s actions while continuing to warn that “these outdated tank cars are ticking time bombs, and local first responders need to know when they are coming and what they are carrying so they can be adequately prepared for any scenario.”

“The fact that the DOT issued this emergency order today so quickly after our push shows that Secretary Foxx gets it, and I sincerely hope they follow it up with a federal rule that requires the phase-out or retrofitting of outdated DOT-111 tank cars,” Schumer added.